Steam
by PrincessTadashi
Summary: The San Fransokyo Hich Fall Retreat-Hiro, Ezra, and the rest of the Voltron Robotics Team aren't exactly thrilled to be stuck out in the middle of nowhere dodging bullies until they actually win the Oozeball tournament. Things get a little bit tricky, though, when after the game there are only three empty showers left and they have to decide who's pairing up. (Hiro/Ezra; Klance)


Ah, the San Fransokyo High fall retreat. Every year the high school hosted a school retreat, including all grade levels of their students, and every year hundreds of students were loaded onto busses and driven off into the middle of nowhere to "get away from it all" and learn about teamwork and friendship. For a couple of antisocial nerds like Hiro Hamada and Ezra Bridger who couldn't go a day without their technology, it was pure hell on Earth. Every year the best friends (now boyfriends) begged their guardians to write them excuses to get out of having to go-they would have taken being forced to sit silently in a classroom all day over having to suffer through all the annoying pep rallies and stupid trust exercises. But both Ezra's adopted parents and Hiro's aunt always forced them to go anyways-they said it "built character", although Hiro swore that their guardians just wanted to have an excuse to get them out of the house for a couple days so the could have some alone time. Last year it hadn't been so bad-at least Hiro's older brother, Tadashi, had been there to protect them from bullies and jerks. But this year they would be totally unprotected and there was no telling what would happen. Hiro had tried to convince his elder sibling to come along as a chaperone, even bribing him with some new robot parts that he'd had his eye on, but his brother had only apologized and said that, as a college freshman, he had too many assignments and projects to be able to get away. At least the boys' robotics team's coach, Shiro, was coming on the retreat, so that had given them some hope for protection. But after finding out that the girl's gym coach, Allura (who the entire robotics team had conspired to get him together with), was also coming, they got the feeling that he was going to be a little… distracted for the duration of the trip and as such wouldn't be much help.

At least the bus ride wasn't too terrible-they managed to claim a few rows just for the other members of the robotics team (Hunk, Pidge, and the newly dating Keith and Lance) and so they were able to keep each other entertained on the long drive as well as fend off any possible attacks from bullies. Their robotics coach also must have been pulling a few strings for them because once they got to the campsite it turned out that all of them (well, except Pidge because she was a girl) were going to be in the same cabin with Shiro as their "chaperone". Overall, the guys were beginning to feel like maybe things wouldn't be as bad as they'd originally thought.

Sadly, they were mistaken. The troubles started at lunch when a few jocks "accidentally" spilled spaghetti on all of them. Things only declined from there, with the bullies finding a way to humiliate or not-so-covertly attempt to injure them during the entirety of the afternoon's activities, from managing to give poor Hunk a wedgie via the zipline to "accidentally" pushing Hiro into the lake to shoving Pidge into a patch of poison ivy. By the time they reached the last activity of the afternoon, they were all wincing in pain or shivering from the cold or itching like crazy. All they wanted to do was just slink back to their respective cabins and lay low for the rest of the night. But Lance, the team captain, wasn't about to let his friends admit defeat.

"Guys, c'mon, things aren't that bad!" he says, addressing his teammates while they miserably waited for the final activity to start.

"Yeah, they kind of are," Pidge answers flatly, adjusting her glasses and doing her best not to scratch at the angry red welts on her legs.

"Okay, sure, we've had some really shitty stuff happen to us," Lance admits. "But it's not like we haven't been through stuff like this at school!"

"Exactly," Ezra sighs, still trying to pick lake gunk out of his hair from when he'd jumped in to save Hiro. "It's just like school-isn't this supposed to be where we're supposed to be getting away from all of that?"

"All right, granted," Lance agrees, not losing any of his confidence. "But think about it-this isn't school! We have a lot more freedom here, and we actually have a way to fight back!"

"What do you mean?" Keith asks, looking up at him and raising an eyebrow (he was the only one who hadn't been pranked yet, but he had a sinking suspicion that he was next.)

"What I mean is we have a huge opportunity here!" Keith cries, gesturing to the field behind them where the next activity was about to take place-some sort of game called Oozeball that was pretty much dodgeball only a whole lot muddier. "We're about to go up against the entire school, and no one expects nerds like us to make it past one round! But I say 'Ha' to that! Again, I say, 'Ha!' They have us severely underestimated! With our special skills, we have a chance to show them all exactly what we're made of!"

"What 'special skills'?" Hunk asks.

"All these years of ducking and hiding from bullies will finally pay off!" Lance declares. "We can dodge all those balls and, once we have them all on our side of the field, we can launch our attack!"

"That… has its possibilities," Hiro says, considering the other teen's words.

"I do like the idea of finally sticking it to them," Ezra agrees with a slight smile.

"And we do have plenty of experience from the cafeteria of trying to avoid sliding on slippery substances," Pidge notes, thinking of all the times bullies had poured food and various drinks in their paths.

"Exactly!" Lance cries, capitalizing on their growing enthusiasm. "And we have something else that none of them have!"

"A burning desire for revenge?" Keith says, cracking a wry smile.

"...I was going to say heart and passion, but that works too!" Lance laughs before standing up on the table that they were sitting at and saying firmly, "We are the paladins of the Voltron robotics team! We will not be defeated this time! We will conquer, and we. will. WIN!"

"Yeah!" the others cheer, getting caught up in his excitement in spite of themselves.

"What team are we?" Lance demands.

"Voltron!"

"I can't hear you! I said, WHAT TEAM ARE WE?!"

"VOLTRON!"

"DAMN STRAIGHT! NOW LET'S GO OUT THERE AND _WIN THIS THING_!" Lance shouts as their team is called out onto the field.

Confidence fully restored by their leader's pep talk, the team runs out to take their places. Whether it was Lance's words or just all their experience of dodging unwanted projectiles, somehow or other their little adopted family of nerds manages to absolutely crush their competition. They almost don't believe it when they're declared the winners of the Oozeball tournament, but their ridiculously tacky trophy and the picture of all of them, absolutely coated from head to toe in mud but grinning like idiots, was proof enough. To celebrate, they end up playing around in the mud, doing ridiculous impersonations of each other and the opponents that they had absolutely _whipped,_ until Shiro finally calls them in to tell them that they needed to go take showers if they wanted to actually be let into the dining room for supper.

By the time that the guys all manage to make it to their showers, there was a pretty long line because everyone had to wash off after the game. Still, none of them really minded the wait-they were still caught up in the euphoria of their victory and being able to smile smugly at the bullies they had totally creamed as they walked past them.

It wasn't until they had finally reached the front of the line that they realized that there was an unintended downside to being the last ones to take the showers.

"All right, there are three stalls and I'm not waiting around for all five of you to take separate showers," the guy in charge of the showers tells them dryly, obviously very much done with having to deal with adolescent boys and all their shenanigans that they could get up to. "You're all boys, you can just share."

"W-Wait!" Hiro flushes bright red, glancing around at the others-maybe if four-fifths of them weren't gay and currently in relationships this wouldn't be a problem, or maybe if those of them that were together had been further along in their relationships. But both couples had just barely started out-Hiro didn't know about Lance and Keith, but he and Ezra were just barely graduated from shy holding of hands to the slightly heavy kissing phase! Did this guy actually expect them to get naked in front of each other?! Maybe if they explained-?

"S-Sir, there's a slight problem," Ezra starts to say. "You see, we're kind of dating, and so are they…" He gestures to himself and Hiro and then Keith and Lance. "So us showering together-"

"Look, as long as you guys don't get too loud about and you do it quick, I don't care what you do in there, just hurry it up!" the guy answers, seeming done with this argument and on the verge of going from bored disinterest to snapping.

The five guys look at each other at a loss before finally awkwardly stumbling into the shower area. "I guess we could shower with not our boyfriends…?" Ezra says slowly.

"Not that I don't trust you guys, but I'd really rather not shower with any of you…" Hunk admits, blushing bright red. "I didn't really have siblings growing up, so I've never actually had to shower with anyone else before…"

"I've had to shower with Dashi before when we were younger," Hiro quietly muses. "I guess it wouldn't be that different…"

"I had to shower with my bros too," Lance agrees, seeming relieved by the thought.

"So it wouldn't be weird if we showered together 'cause we're like brothers!"

"Totally!"

"Uh, you forget that would leave me and Ezra to have to shower together, and, I'm sorry Ez, but I didn't have any siblings and honestly I just don't feel comfortable showering with someone else's boyfriend," Keith points out.

"No offense to you either, but same," Ezra agrees-he'd only grown up with an adopted sister so he hadn't been forced to share the shower with anyone else growing up either.

"HURRY IT UP IN THERE!" the shower guy calls impatiently.

"Guess we're showering together, then…" Hiro says, realizing they had no other choice and flashing his boyfriend a nervous smile.

"Guess so…" Ezra agrees, trying not to let on just how freaked out he was feeling at the moment.

The guys all awkwardly wave to each other before heading into their respective stalls. For Hiro and Ezra there was an uncomfortable moment as they both set their shower stuff down, procrastinating as much as possible before having to face the prospect of actually getting undressed in front of each other. Still, there was only so much organizing of shampoo bottles you could do and eventually Ezra knew that he had to start stripping. He nervously glances over to see what his boyfriend was doing and sees that Hiro had actually turned away to start taking off his clothes. He decides to do that too-the less they had to see at this point, the better.

Ezra had gotten his shoes and shirts off and was starting to take off his shorts when he had a thought.

"Hey, Hiro, maybe we can just leave on, like, our under layer of clothing-we might end up being a bit cold until we can change back at the cabin, but it might make things less awkward," he says.

"Oh!" Something about the way Hiro said that told him that his boyfriend hadn't thought about that idea and had already fully stripped, and while cognitively he knew he should just wait for him to maybe put some of his clothes back on stupid human reflexes caused him to automatically turn towards the sound and found himself looking at Hiro-all of him.

"I-I can put them back on," Hiro squeaks, cheeks instantly turning bright pink.

"N-No, i-it's okay," Ezra stammers thickly, doing his best to keep his eyes above the waist level, at the very least. He didn't want to be a perv and stare, but it was hard to know where to look when his boyfriend was literally standing there naked in front of him. Part of him felt sorry for Hiro, looking so nervous and even scared, his skinny arms wrapped protectively around his torso, but the other part was marveling at just how _tiny_ his boyfriend actually was. He'd always known that he was on the small side, but usually the baggy clothes he wore gave him at least the illusion of having some sort of bulk to him. In reality, though, underneath all of that it turned out that he was as small and delicate as a bird without its feathers. His waist was so tiny that Ezra's hands could have easily fit around it if he'd wanted to put them around it-and he wanted to. Oh, he totally wanted to. There was so much of Hiro that he wanted to explore-

But NO! He finally forces himself to avert his eyes, blushing deep red and feeling like a horrible person for having looked as long as he had. They were being forced into this situation, but that gave him no right to try to take advantage of his boyfriend like this-poor Hiro was scared enough, he didn't want to make it any worse for him.

He hears the sound of Hiro shuffling through his pile of clothes before finally saying, "I-it's okay now…"

Ezra awkwardly glances over at him again, slightly relieved to see that he was wearing boxer shorts now. Since that was what both of them were wearing, it was almost like they were just going swimming in their swim trunks or something-not such a big deal. He was still having a hard time not staring at his boyfriend's bare torso, but this was better, at least.

"C-C'mon, we should probably turn the water on before the others use up all of the hot water that's actually left," Hiro says, awkwardly gesturing to the tap on the wall. He still seemed incredibly embarrassed and slightly nervous but having at least some sort of clothing on seemed to be helping.

"R-Right," Ezra agrees, nodding and reaching to turn the water on.

It turned out that, unsurprisingly, the water was cold and so they were just going to have to shiver through it as best they could. At first their main focus is just rinsing off as much of their caked-on mud as possible. Still, as they move on to actually scrubbing down once the majority of it was gone, Ezra has to try not to think too much about how amazing Hiro looked with the water flowing down over him, the gentle river taming his perpetually messy hair and running down his chest in shining streams _-_

 _No, bad Ezra! Stop it!_ he chides himself, looking away again. He was definitely glad that this was a cold shower or else he might have been in major trouble.

Needless to say, both teens were extremely glad when the shower was over. As soon as they shut the water off, they practically dive for their towels and clothes, again avoiding eye contact as they hurry to get dressed. Having to wear wet shorts underneath the clean pants they'd brought with was a bit uncomfortable, but it was less uncomfortable than the idea of having to get fully naked in front of each other.

When they exit the shower, they found Hunk already waiting for them. He kind of awkwardly nods a greeting to them and they nod back, not really sure what they were supposed to say. A few minutes later Keith and Lance leave their shower, although in a decidedly less somber mood than Hiro and Eza. If anything, both of them seemed to be fighting grins and were being a lot more touchy-feely with each other than the rest of their teammates had ever seen them before. Hunk actually has to clear his throat to remind them that they weren't alone in the room.

"Oh, hey guys!" Lance greets them, a bit too cheerful for the otherwise awkward moment. "C'mon, let's get going before they run out of food in the cafeteria, huh? Last one there is a rotten egg!"

He takes off out of the shower area, dragging a still blushing but grinning Keith after him.

Shrugging slightly and apparently taking the excuse to leave the awkwardness behind him, Hunk hurries off after them. Ezra follows but forces himself to hang back when he sees how slowly Hiro was walking.

"You okay?" he asks softly, reaching over to take his boyfriend's hand in his own.

"F-Fine!" Hiro stammers, making it obvious that he was definitely not fine.

"Hiro, c'mon, talk to me," Ezra says softly, moving around so that he was fully facing his boyfriend, who was refusing to meet his gaze. "Please," he quietly begs. "I can't do anything to fix this unless you tell me what's wrong."

"D-Do you think I'm ugly?" Hiro finally asks quietly.

"Ugly?" Ezra frowns in confusion. "Why would you even ask that?"

"I-In the shower… It was like you were trying to avoid looking at me…" Hiro whispers, to Ezra's horror looking like was about to start crying. "A-Am I really that ugly that you can't stand to look at me?"

"Oh, Hiro, no!" Ezra cries, instantly pulling him into a tight hug. "Oh my gosh, you thought I wasn't looking at you because I thought you were ugly? Hiro, you couldn't be more wrong! I wasn't looking at you because… Well, honestly I thought you were the most beautiful person I've ever seen and I didn't want to hurt you by looking at you and thinking those thoughts about you when you weren't giving me any sign that you were ready for me to be looking at you like that!"

"R-Really?" Hiro looks up at him, cheeks flushed but eyes sparkling slightly. "Y-You really think that about me?"

"Of course!" Ezra answers, leaning down to peck him on the forehead. "And someday, I hope I'll get a chance to see you like that again-but only when we're both ready for it, okay?"

"O-Okay…" Hiro agrees, smiling and nuzzling into him before adding shyly, "For the record… You're also very handsome…"

"Yeah?" Eza can't help but grin slightly at that as he hugs his boyfriend closer.

"Yeah," Hiro agrees, grinning back up at him.

"Well, thank you for that." Ezra gently kisses his forehead again before asking, "So, you ready to go get some dinner?"

"Definitely!" Hiro agrees with a grin, taking his hand again.

"Okay then!" Ezra chuckles, starting to lead him towards the cafeteria building. "Let's go!"

"So…" Hiro says after a few minutes of walking in contented silence. "Do you think Keith and Lance were actually… You know…"

"I have no idea!" Ezra bursts out laughing. "They were certainly acting like it!"

"Wow…" Hiro also starts laughing. "I just hope they don't start talking about it while we're eating dinner!"

"Ew, gross!" Ezra agrees, wrinkling up his nose.

"Hopefully they at least know better than to talk about it in front of Shiro if they did!"

"Agreed!"

"We might have to force Shiro to sit with us just to be safe!"

"I am all for that!"

"C'mon, let's go find him, then!"

"Right!" Eza laughs as he lets his boyfriend pull him towards the cafeteria, chasing after him. All the really mattered was that things were okay between them. This whole situation could have gone a lot worse than they had, but they'd made it through it okay. Someday, Ezra hoped, maybe he'd be lucky enough to be the guy Hiro was willing to fully share himself with. But for now they could keep things simple and innocent between them. That's exactly where they were meant to be right now and, honestly, Ezra couldn't have been happier with the way things were.


End file.
